


Bedtime

by Pegasus143



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Fluff, Gen, Kid Fic, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-28
Updated: 2021-02-28
Packaged: 2021-03-15 01:54:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,310
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29306070
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pegasus143/pseuds/Pegasus143
Summary: In which Allura refuses to go to bed, reminding Melenor of every moment with her family.
Relationships: Alfor & Allura & Allura's Mother (Voltron)
Comments: 4
Kudos: 2
Collections: Black Is Beautiful 2021





	Bedtime

**Author's Note:**

  * For [HandmaidenOfHorror](https://archiveofourown.org/users/HandmaidenOfHorror/gifts).



> It was super fun to write this and expand on some ideas that had been floating around in my brain!

“Okay, it is time for bed, my love,” Melenor said as Allura ran into her arms.

“But Mama, I can’t, there’s a klanmuirl after me!” Allura shouted, pointing to where Alfor was crawling quickly down the hallway.

“Do you want to know a secret?” Melenor asked, leaning closer to Allura, her voice dropping to a whisper.

She nodded eagerly.

“Eventually, all living things must tire… even klanmuirls. Look at his eyes. What do you see?”

Allura glanced between her parents, confused. “They’re just… eyes.”

“Exactly. Which means his heart is not truly invested in the chase.” Melenor stepped forward towards Alfor, holding out a hand that he quickly accepted.

Alfor grimaced as he stood, rubbing his knee after letting go of Melenor’s hand.

“What does ‘invested’ mean?” Allura asked, her eyes bright with curiosity.

“It means,” Alfor said, his voice scratchy and hoarse from making the various roars and growls of a klanmuirl, “That you’re enjoying something, so much that you can’t think about anything else, like you’ve forgotten that the rest of the world exists.”

“Does that mean we can get invested in something and forget about bedtime?” Allura asked, doing her best to cover a yawn with her tiny hand.

Melenor and Alfor exchanged glances, Alfor giving that playful, teasing smile that first drew her to him. It hadn’t changed one bit since the first time they met – well, except for the time that the paladins had taken their helmets off on planet [name] and their heads got all swollen, but a cryopod had easily fixed that. Melenor shook her head, snapping herself out of it. She was _not_ going to let herself be taken in by that grin, especially when they had a _child_ to take care of. “No, we can’t forget about bedtime. That is too important to forget.”

Allura pouted and crossed her arms. Melenor ignored her for the time being as the three of them started walking through the castle halls towards their bedchambers. Allura’s face began to relax, and her head fell against her mother’s shoulder. _Alfor must have really tired her out._ Melenor glanced towards her husband, nodding towards where Allura was beginning to fall into dreams. Alfor’s footsteps stopped for a moment before they fell back into pace behind Melenor, likely so he could see their daughter’s cute sleeping face. _I’ll never forget when she was a baby and we went picnicking in the juniberry fields. While we were cleaning her lunch off of her, she fell asleep right there, her eyelids fluttering shut and her cheeks rounded as if she’d filled them with the berries. Sometimes she’d even purse her lips or furrow her eyebrows in her sleep as a baby… I could have watched her forever._ That was what pictures and videos were for, she supposed – and she happened to know that there were quite a few more than either her or Alfor would like to admit stored in the castle’s memory.

Suddenly, Melenor felt Allura shift, and Alfor made a sound of surprise. Allura’s head popped up immediately, as if she hadn’t been about to go to dreamland a few ticks ago, and she started looking around. Spotting the door to her bedroom only a few footsteps away, she began to squirm in Melenor’s arms. “I’m not sleepy!” she shouted, crossing her arms and pouting.

Melenor had to giggle a little at that face. It was obvious she was mad, but she still looked so _cute_ when she did that.

“Stop it! Not funny!” she shouted, squirming even more. Alfor ran ahead to get the door and the lights, so that once Allura inevitably squirmed out of Melenor’s arms – she was always worried about accidentally hurting her daughter – she’d fall on top of the mountain of pillows on her bed.

“No, no, no! Bedtime is cancelled!” she demanded in a very grown-up tone of voice, scrambling to sit up but only falling deeper into the mountain of pillows.

Alfor lost his composure, holding his stomach in a fit of laughter.

“Daddy, help me!” She waved her arms around as if she was drowning.

Melenor shook her head at the display, turning to the chest of drawers in the corner of the room. She slid open one of them, where several nightgowns were folded neatly. “What color nightgown would you like to wear? Pink or blue?” The words had just barely left her mouth when she realized she’d made a grave mistake. She turned around, seeing how Allura’s eyebrows furrowed at the words. _No more thinking about how cute she looks; if that happens even once more we’ll all be too far gone for anyone to get to bed on time, and Alfor and I will both be all sore in the morning from sleeping in a child’s bed._

“Neither,” Allura said. “No nightgowns. No bedtime.”

 _I suppose she doesn’t_ have _to wear a nightgown to bed… she didn’t do anything to get dirty today, and she’ll change clothes in the morning, so what’s the harm if she just wears today’s clothes?_ “No nightgown,” Melenor agreed, closing the drawer with her hip. “But you _do_ need to have bedtime. What story would you like?”

“The day you met Mama!” Allura exclaimed, her eyes lighting up.

“Alright,” Alfor said. “One day, the paladins of Voltron decided that we should have a series of contests, in order to bring together the people of our planets. Each paladin would make up a contest for the people of our planets to enter. The first contest was a sparring contest, chosen by Zarkon…”

The story was familiar in Melenor’s ears as she took advantage of Allura’s distraction to rearrange her pillows and turn down the bedsheets. She could almost repeat the whole thing word-for-word in her head, only tripping up on the parts where Alfor left out some of the bloodier details that came out easily when they were conversing with the paladins.

“The final contest,” Alfor said, laying Allura down in bed before kneeling down on the floor, “Was a memory contest.”

“You forgot to say that you chose it,” Allura said as Melenor quickly tucked the blankets around her before sitting down on the end of the bed.

“That I did,” Alfor said before continuing. “I chose a memory contest, where the people had to look at things, like words or pictures, and later repeat them back quickly. This was the contest that your mother entered. I remember hearing her voice for the first time, how when she talked, it sounded like she was telling a story instead of saying a list of call numbers for every known Balmera in the universe.” He paused, as if waiting for Allura to ask a question, like “What’s a call number?” or “How did it sound like she was telling a story?” but no questions came.

A fond smile appeared on Alfor’s face. “She’s asleep,” he mouthed before pressing a kiss to her temple.

Melenor did the same before the two of them tiptoed out of the room, dimming the lights as they left. “You never get to tell the last part of that story, do you,” she said teasingly once the door had slid shut behind them.

“Hmm… I don’t think I’ve said it in a very long time… I may have forgotten.” Sparkles appeared in his eyes. “Would you care to remind me?”

“Gladly,” Melenor said, smiling, “Though I can’t believe you’ve forgotten my favorite part: at the medal ceremony, you completely forgot my name.”

Alfor looked away, embarrassed. “You don’t have to remind me. How about you show me what you’ve been working on in the memory chamber?”

Melenor rolled her eyes at his obvious attempt to change the subject, but started heading towards the chamber anyways. There would be plenty more bedtimes to make sure that he never forgot about it.


End file.
